Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Woman who was dragged by deputy settles lawsuit
A mentally ill woman who was dragged across a courthouse hallway by a Broward sheriff’s detention deputy has reached an agreement to settle her civil-rights lawsuit against the agency, her lawyer said.
David Frankel, the attorney representing Dasyl Rios, confirmed the agreement Thursday. Under the terms, how much money his client will receive is confidential.
It’ll be an “adequate amount,” Frankel said, “to compensate her for the humiliation, the embarrassment of bodily being dragged through the courthouse in front of the public.
“And hopefully it’s enough to make the sheriff address the rights of people who are mentally ill.”
Sheriff’s spokeswoman Veda Coleman-Wright said the
agency wasn’t allowed to discuss the case because of confidentiality. She said it’s an “agreement in principle” that hasn’t been signed yet.
In the Feb. 23, 2015, incident that made national headlines, Rios was seen on cellphone video being dragged by the shackles around her ankles by Christopher Johnson, a detention deputy, and screaming “You’re hurting me!”
Bill Gelin, a defense lawyer who runs the JAA Blog courthouse news and gossip site, recorded the footage.
At the time, Rios was 28 years old and had been diagnosed with “significant mental illness,” according to the lawsuit. She was arrested in December 2014 on a cocaine possession charge at a Deerfield Beach motel.
She was in court for a probation violation on a misdemeanor trespassing charge in February 2015, when she decided she wanted to speak to her mother who was sitting in the back of the courtroom.
The lawsuit said Johnson “forcefully directed her outside the courtroom. Distraught, shackled and handcuffed, [she] sat down on a public bench and began to cry.”
He demanded she get up and when Rios refused, he grabbed the leg shackles binding her ankles, pulled her off the bench onto the floor and began dragging her down the hallway, according to the lawsuit.
As he did so, Johnson told her, “Now we’ll do it my way,” or “Now you’re mine,” according to the lawsuit.
He dragged Rios about 300 feet, or the length of a football field, according to the suit. Frankel wrote the deputy’s “actions were inhumane, and intolerable in a civilized society.”
Rios is heard pleading with Johnson in the video.
“Stop! You’re hurting me!” she screams. “You’re **** ing hurting me! I hate my life! I wish they would kill me already! Why do I have to be alive?”
“I gave you a chance ...” Johnson says.
“You didn’t give nobody a chance,” she yells back. “All I wanted to do was sob for a few minutes — cry. That’s all I wanted to do was cry for a few minutes.”
Prosecutors did not pursue charges in the dragging case, and Johnson is on active duty with the Sheriff’s Office, the agency said.
Public Defender Howard Finkelstein, whose office also represents mentally ill defendants, said he was outraged when he saw the video. Since the footage became public, he has seen a cultural change within the Sheriff’s Office to be “kindler and gentler” — by its policies and procedures — to those suffering with mental illness, he said.
“What I really hope the most is she understands because of what happened to her, life has gotten much better for people with mental illness,” Finkelstein said. “She has changed how the Sheriff Office and courts act to others in the throes of a crisis and that is because of her.
“What happened to this woman,” he said, “should never happen to anyone again.”
Frankel said now, Rios “is doing very well. Still struggling with her mental health issues, but has the support of a really great loving family.”